Build your own '80s-style Mario videogame with new Nintendo product

Do you miss the original Mario Bros. videogame from the '80s? Nintendo has created a new Mario Maker game that allows '80s fans to recreate their favorite version of the Mario series of adventures. The product was debuted this week at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, according to Businessweek.com.

The video presentation showed a Wii U preloaded with Mario characters and graphics. Players build their own world using the obligatory pipes, bricks and coins. According to Nintendo, the game will be available to consumers in 2015.

Mario Bros., featuring Italian plumbers Mario and Luigi fighting creatures in the New York City sewers in order to save a princess, was first created for arcades by Nintendo in 1983. It was developed by two of the lead creators of Donkey Kong. It was available on the Nintendo Entertainment System as well as the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Apple II and Commodore 64. In 1993, it became a feature film, Super Mario Bros., starring Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo as the plumbing bothers and Dennis Hopper as the villain Koopa. It holds a predictably rotten 16 percent "fresh rating" on Rotten Tomatoes.

About this blog

Relive the '80s music, movies and culture with Tampa Bay Times correspondent Steve Spears. A teen during the greatest decade ever, Steve is obsessed with everything from Duran Duran to Journey, John Hughes to John Cusack, and parachute pants to big hair.